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Australia's engagement with the Financial Action Task Force

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The Financial Action Task Force (FATF) is an inter-governmental body established in 1989 by the ministers of its member jurisdictions. It is a policy making body that sets the International Standards on Combating Money Laundering and the Financing of Terrorism and Proliferation (FATF Standards). In February 2012, the FATF released the revised 40 Recommendations, which comprise the FATF Standards.

The FATF promotes effective implementation of legal, regulatory and operational measures to fight money laundering, terrorist financing and other related threats to the integrity of the international financial system.

Australia is a founding member of the FATF and our department heads the delegation for Australia at all FATF meetings.

Australia’s mutual evaluation

The FATF assesses its members’ compliance with the FATF Standards through a mutual evaluation process. The fourth round of assessments of countries’ compliance with the revised FATF Standards began in late 2013. It focuses on the effectiveness of countries’ anti-money laundering and counter-terrorism financing (AML/CTF) regimes, as well as countries’ technical compliance with the FATF 40 Recommendations.

Australia underwent the mutual evaluation process in 2014 as one of the first countries to be assessed against the revised FATF Standards. Australia’s mutual evaluation report was considered and adopted at the FATF plenary meeting on 27 February 2015. The final report was released on 21 April 2015 and is available from the FATF website.